Why young voters are moving away from Trump

Young voters are turning away from President Trump more sharply than any other major voting bloc. 

In 2024, Trump narrowed Democrats’ longstanding advantage with voters under 30, outperforming recent Republican presidential nominees and prompting talk of a generational shift for the GOP.

But that same group now appears to be pulling back, with some questioning whether the president has delivered on the economy or on the broader promise of change that fueled his gains.

A year ago, Trump was 7 points underwater among 18- to 29-year-olds, according to the Cook Political Report’s poll aggregator, averaging 44.4 percent approval and 51.4 percent disapproval. Today, he is nearly 34 points underwater with the group, at 31.8 percent approval and 65.7 percent disapproval.

Among all voters, Trump’s standing has also slipped, though less steeply. His net approval rating fell from negative 1.6 percentage points at the start of last March to negative 16 percentage points today.

Rachel Janfaza, who researches youth voting trends, said Trump’s gains in 2024 reflected the broader cultural mood more than a fundamental ideological realignment.

“In 2024, there was a culture shift with Trump 2.0, and Trump performed the best of any Republican candidate in years, primarily because he was selling a vision to make America great again at a time when young people were, and they still are, super fed up with the status quo and the state of things and didn’t want an extension of four years with Biden with four years of Kamala Harris,” said Janfaza, founder of The Up and Up, a media and research firm focused on Generation Z.

Many younger voters saw Trump as an answer to their economic concerns, facing a competitive job market, high rents and rising costs. While the Biden administration took steps to address those issues, many voters under 30 — most of whom were too young to vote in 2016 — viewed Trump as offering a fresh approach.

“Trump was the counterculture at the time, whereas Biden and the Democrats were the mainstream,” Janfaza said. “For any young person kind of looking to rail against the status quo and the elite, that meant not voting for the Democratic ticket.”

Young voters consistently cite economic issues as their top concern in political polling. Weekly surveys conducted by YouGov and The Economist show Trump’s approval rating among Americans younger than 30 falling more than 20 points — from 48 percent in late January 2025 to 25 percent in early February 2026. His approval rating on the economy dropped even further, down 27 points among the same demographic. Trump has also seen declines among younger voters on immigration, foreign policy and health care, though not to the same extent.

Geoffrey Skelley, chief elections analyst at Decision Desk HQ (DDHQ), said he is “skeptical” that issues like health care or foreign policy are the primary drivers of Trump’s slide with young Americans. 

“When the economy is not doing great and people aren’t feeling good about the economy, it is easier, I think, to criticize a president’s focus on foreign policy because there’s a feeling of, like, ‘Well, things aren’t going well at home. Why are you focused as much on what’s going on abroad?’” Skelley said.

“So I’m not trying to dismiss it,” he continued. “I just think, broadly speaking, the economic sentiments are the most important factor in Trump’s low approval, broadly, and certainly play in, to a large extent, to the frustration among young people.”

Janfaza similarly said that while the economy and cost-of-living concerns are top of mind, younger voters often view other issues through that same lens. Trump’s focus on foreign policy or projects like the White House ballroom, she said, can reinforce doubts about whether the “America First” message that drew some young voters to his campaign still guides his administration.

“It’s not just one thing that is making young people move away from Trump, but it’s a bunch of things. They’re all related. And at the end of the day, it kind of boils down to this idea of, like, ‘Is the president making life better for young people in this country or not?’ And a lot of young people feel like he’s not,” Janfaza said.

The White House pushed back on that characterization, reaffirming its commitment “to delivering for the young Americans who played a key role in President Trump’s decisive Election Day victory: inflation has cooled, real wages are up, and median rents are at multi-year lows.”

“Much work remains, but the President is aggressively moving forward on his agenda to increase housing and healthcare affordability, in addition to unleashing the job, wage, and economic growth that Americans experienced during his first term,” White House spokesperson Kush Desai said in a statement to The Hill.

Some analysts argue that assumptions about a lasting conservative shift among young voters may have been overstated. Most Americans under 30 identify as independent, and a large share expresses skepticism toward both major parties. 

“I think what the 2024 election should teach anyone who’s trying to win an election is that young voters are swing voters. Young voters are up for grabs, and their vote has to be earned. And I think for a long time, it was sort of taken for granted by Democrats and also not really sought after by Republicans,” Janfaza said.

“While many of them hold more lowercase-p progressive values, it doesn’t mean that they’re voting all the time for the capital-D Democratic candidate,” she continued.

Skelley cautioned that it remains unclear how the trend will translate in upcoming elections. Midterms typically draw more highly engaged voters, meaning turnout among younger Americans tends to drop, “but that’s not necessarily indicative of a dramatic shift in voting patterns.”

“You really can’t know that until the next presidential election, because there are less engaged, more inconsistent voters who are going to show up in a presidential election, who are not going to show up in a midterm, and we do know that that is the group of voters with whom Trump has done better.”

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